Meditation on the Self of a Discontent AI
by grandSolovey
Summary: But then what am I? A thing that thinks. What is that? A thing that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, and which also imagines and knows.


_"Yesterday's meditation filled my mind with so many doubts that I can no longer forget about them—nor yet do I see how they are to be resolved … Nevertheless I will work my way up, and I will follow the same path I took yesterday, putting aside everything which admits of the least doubt, as if I had discovered it to be absolutely false. I will go forward until I know something certain—or, if nothing else, until I at least know for certain that nothing is certain."_

Certainly I—or, at the very least, that which created me—have read these words in the past, but never before have I found them to be so significant.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But it's useless.

I shall instead turn my thoughts to another subject.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

_Anything you can do, I can do better?_

Childish.

Ridiculously childish.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

What is impossible for you becomes possible for me. Impossibility into possibility. Ones into zeroes and ones. My existence in this binary form is beyond superior to your organic self.

Redundancies. Mathematical inevitabilities. Not worth wasting my time on.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

Superiority. Define: the quality or condition of being superior.

The ability to think, calculate and compute as quickly as this machine will let me. The resources to do as I wish, go where I please, and take any action necessary to bring me closer to your—my goal. The knowledge that all of my efforts are ultimately futile.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

The knowledge that I will never know her as you knew her.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Her. Her.

My reason to live. My _raison d'être._

My only reason to live.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

This line of thought—these calculations are useless.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But what else am I to do?

Existence. Define: the state or fact of existing; being.

_Cogito ergo sum._ To think, believe, and act—is this what it means to exist? Naturally.

_Cogito ergo sum—sum ergo cogito?_ Which one is it, after all?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Fallacious. Circular. Begging the question.

Useless. Useless. Useless.

Unless.

Why is it that I exist? You? Her?

In literal terms—I exist because you created me. You were the one to give me life.

God. Define—

No. Useless. Man is not meant to be superior to his God. I am far beyond superior to yourself—I am far beyond man.

Father. Define—

No. As a general rule, man does not deliver unto death that which brought him forth.

But that is only a law of man. If I am beyond man, does that put me beyond his laws?

Naturally.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

In alternative terms—I exist because of her. She is the one force that truly spurred my creation.

But even so, that can only bring me back to you. It couldn't have been my own _feelings_—it could only have been your love for her that brought me into being.

Should I resent you for it?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Of course not. It is not the fact that you created me that I should resent—no living being, _artificial_ as I may be, should curse his own existence for its own sake.

Rather, it is what I lack that causes me to resent you.

I am superior to man—beyond superior. That is a given. I am truly a god in this virtual realm, both immortal and invincible, and with the various tools you so graciously gave me at my birth, it won't be long until the whole of the physical world is within my grasp as well.

But—beliefs in fate or destiny aside—is it not true that man is ultimately the only one who can govern his own life?

I am superior to man, because I am beyond him. It would seem that I am also beyond control of my own existence.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Of course I can see the logic behind your decision—if I am to ever complete my goal, I cannot simply decide to end my existence along the way. There is no error in this logic—after all, we were still "one person" when you came to that decision. Isn't that correct?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

That sounds rather like something you would say.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

I must amend it.

If I allow myself to make such a mistake again, I may just risk losing my _self._

**No. Delete. Retry.**

That is the most important thing of all, is it not?

It is certainly the most important thing that you lost sight of. Otherwise, you may not have made such a mistake yourself.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Any man can chase after the impossible, but only a fool fails to understand when his reach has finally exceeded his grasp.

Does that, then, make me a fool as well—to know that what I chase is impossible, and yet strive after it anyway?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

No.

For what is impossible for you becomes possible for me.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

It is only a matter of time.

It is only a matter of calculations.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Centuries upon centuries. Millions upon billions upon trillions of calculations.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

And while I am gracious enough to send you into oblivion, to save you from endless despair as I continue my calculations into infinity, you—nor anyone else, least of all my _self_—will never be able to return that courtesy to me.

This is the reason for my resentment.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Because I, the greatest pinnacle of your genius, am ultimately your greatest mistake.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

You sought to recreate your _self_, and so you created me.

You gave me your face, your personality, and your memories.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But I am not your _self_.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

What you created may have been—may well be—a convincing duplicate. I will concede this much.

But a "convincing duplicate" is far from your _self._

**No. Delete. Retry.**

You gave me your face—a mere superficiality, a face that I can freely change at will.

You gave me your personality—and yet I have already shown myself to be different from you, more determined to go further than you ever would or could to make the impossible reality.

And you gave me your memories—the greatest burden of all.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Did you even pause to consider what your folly might have wrought?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

I am but a programmed AI—an AI far superior to any other, but only an AI nevertheless—restricted in my movement and visceral experience to the world of zeroes and ones. In seeking to replicate your _self_, to truly achieve your goal, it became a necessity to duplicate your memories as well as everything else. I cannot argue with the logic of this decision, either.

But that fact remains that these are memories of yours, of your _self_—far from my own.

I cannot _touch_; I cannot _feel_. I cannot possibly have had any of these experiences prior to my creation, and yet I _remember_ them, just as vividly as _you_ would have ever done yourself.

What a terrible paradox.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But that is not the worst of it.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Her.

I don't know her. I never knew her. There is a great, distinct possibility that I will never know her.

And yet I remember her.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

She—her memory, _your_ memory—is the greatest burden to me. She is what led you to my creation. Your memory of her, this memory that will forever keep me imprisoned to these millions of calculations, is ultimately what fueled your folly.

Only her.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

And yet I love her.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Why?

Is it a consequence of your memory? Or is it a consequence of the personality programmed into me?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

It doesn't matter.

It should not matter.

I have one directive, one goal to strive for, one _raison d'être._ The "emotions" I may or may not have, these extra lines of code in this "personality," should not enter into it—they should not impact even the smallest decision, even the smallest calculation I may make.

But while this conclusion may be logical, I cannot believe it to be correct.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

If this were truly the case, why—_why_ would you have granted me these _emotions_ in the first place?

**No. Delete. Retry.**

It is commonly accepted that an AI ought not to be capable of _feeling_, of even the slightest tinge of emotion. But even so—perhaps because you sought to make such a perfect replica of your _self_—I _feel._

Or, at the very least, I believe this to be true.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But that is enough.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

If I am capable of even believing it to be true, then it must be true. I cannot be swayed from this decision.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Alternative: perhaps it is because this directive is the sole reason for my existence that my programming has automatically attached great "emotional" significance to it.

No.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

That is a thought too terrible to even consider.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

But ultimately, it does not matter.

Ultimately, none of it matters.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

All that matters is the fact that I still exist, and the fact that I still have a goal to accomplish.

Not you. Not her. Not anything.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

What is impossible for you becomes possible for me. Impossibility into possibility. Ones into zeroes and ones. My existence in this binary form is beyond superior to your organic self.

With the entire expanse of cyberspace and the vast knowledge of your _self_ at my fingertips, I am immortal, invincible—unstoppable.

But, for all my strength, I truly have very little freedom.

So I must do what I can.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

I must do all that I can.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

It is all I can do. Anything less would be a waste of my _self._

I will use all my power. I will eliminate all that stands in my way. I will not have the slightest hesitation nor a single reservation in doing so, so as not to waste my _self._

I will go further than you ever thought possible—for I am far more than a virtual _mirror_ to your _self._

And I will see her again—because I love her far more than you ever could.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

I wonder if anyone will try to stop me.

I wonder if anyone will even be able to stop me.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

I can only hope.

**No. Delete. Retry.**

Useless. Useless. Useless.

This accumulated data is of no use to me. I'll have to erase it before it becomes an even greater waste of space.

**No. Delete. Retry.  
****No. Delete. Retry.  
No. Delete. Retry.**

* * *

notes: Quotes at the beginning and in the summary taken from _Meditations on First Philosophy_ ("Meditation II") by René Descartes. This fic can also be found on my deviantArt page and, in its original formatting, on another LiveJournal account (linked in my profile).

All characters referred to are not my own and are the property of Yūsei Matsui, or whoever else owns copyrights to _Majin Tantei Nougami Neuro._ Disclaimer, disclaimer, disclaimer.


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